The Syrian Conflict.

According to the United Nations, more than 7,500 people have died in Syria since the regime of President Bashar Assad launched a brutal crackdown against protesters last March.

As Syrian activists improve their techniques for transmitting photos and videos of the violence to the outside world, accounts and footage of torture, displaced families, and horrifying deaths have flooded the mainstream media. International condemnation continues to grow, yet Syria's future remains uncertain.

As Syria marks the one-year anniversary of the country's uprising, HuffPost World details some of the key players and events in Syria over the past 12 months.

THE BEGINNING
Syria was a relative latecomer to the Arab Spring. On March 18, 2011, protesters gathered in the southern city of Daraa after Friday prayers. Angered by the arrest and torture of children who had spray-painted anti-government slogans on a wall in the city the month before, demonstrators voiced demands for greater freedoms and political participation.

The protests did not initially demand the resignation of President Bashar Assad. Instead, they focused on the lack of basic freedoms in the country, the monopoly of the Baath party, Syria's security state apparatus and abuses by the elite, Patrick Seale, author of the book The Struggle For Syria, explains in Foreign Policy. Yet security forces responded brutally, firing live ammunition and tear gas at the crowds and killing several protesters.

As anger over civilian deaths grew and protests spread to other cities, Assad offered a series of concessions -- officials implicated in the violence would be fired, a number of political prisoners would be released, and the country's state of emergency would be lifted. The regime maintained its innocence, however, and claimed that foreign agents were to blame for the unrest.

PROTESTS AND VIOLENCE SPREAD
The spring and summer of 2011 were characterized by a steady stream of protests -- often on Fridays after prayers -- and the Syrian government's subsequent violent response to the gatherings. Security forces cracked down hard in the cities of Homs, Hama, and Latakia.

The violence reached new heights toward the end of 2011 as the conflict appeared to militarize. "You now have on average as many as forty people being killed a day. That's one dynamic; the killing has increased, particularly since the Arab League monitors arrived at the end of December," Council on Foreign Relations Middle East expert Robert M. Damin explained in January 2012.

A growing number of defectors -- loosely organized in the Free Syrian Army -- staged guerrilla attacks against security forces. In December and January, two separate bombs targeting security forces killed dozens in the Syrian capital Damascus. While the regime blamed al Qaeda, opposition forces suggested that the government may have staged the explosions in an effort to increase public support of the regime's crackdown on the opposition.

'MASSACRE' IN HOMS

In February 2012, regime forces launched a brutal assault on the city of Homs and the rebel-held neighborhood of Baba Amr in particular. Bombs and rockets rained down on the city for weeks, killing hundreds of people -- many of them civilians. Government forces eventually retook control of the city, driving the Free Syrian army out. British photographer Paul Conroy described the siege of Homs as a "massacre." Talking to Sky News, Conroy said Syrian forces were "systematic in moving through neighborhoods with munitions that are used for battlefields." He added that "men, women and children" were "cowering in houses" and "beyond shellshock."

The regime's strategic victory in Homs was followed by attacks on the rebel strongholds of Idlib and Daraa. "Shelter is hard to find when mortars take out entire sides of buildings," Al Jazeera's Anita McNaught reported from Idlib. "Syrian army tanks and army personel carriers fire randomly and indiscriminately into the streets," she wrote.

SECTARIANISM IN SYRIA
The events in Homs illustrate the rise of sectarian conflict in Syria. Commentators have observed that the country may be headed for civil war.

The majority of Syrians belong to the Sunni Muslim community, but the country also has significant Christian, Shiia and Alawi groups. President Bashar Assad belongs to the Alawi community, a sect that split from Shia Islam and makes up about 12 percent of the population in Syria. Alawites hold many key positions in the Syrian government.

THE REGIME'S TAKE
"We don't kill our people... no government in the world kills its people, unless it's led by a crazy person," Bashar Assad told ABC's Barbara Walters in an interview. Assad defiantly denied ordering a crackdown against protesters and claimed that most of the people killed were either regime supporters or security forces. Instead, Syria blames Israel and the West for the conflict, accusing "armed gangs," "terrorists" and "saboteurs" of instigating violence.

THE OPPOSITION
"As long as Bashar al-Assad is in power in Syria, the future of Syria is going to be unfortunately a very bloody one," former U.S. diplomat Dennis Ross told Reuters.

It is unclear who would fill the void in the event of the fall of the Assad regime. "Syria's opposition is divided," Robert M. Damin writes for the Council on Foreign Relations. "You have the Syrian National Council. You have another group called the National Coordination Committee for Democratic Change, which represents many of the opposition groups inside Syria. And there is a very strong division between them. They have tried to come together and overcome their differences but they have not succeeded; Syria is a very heterogeneous country."

Similarly, reports suggest the Free Syrian Army is far from a unified organization with a single command structure. According to the BBC, the FSA was formed in August 2011 by former members of the Syrian army and led by former air force colonel Riyad al-Assaad. "Col Asaad claims to have 15,000 men under his command and that soldiers are defecting every day and being assigned tasks by the FSA. However, analysts believe there may be no more than 7,000," the BBC writes in its 'Guide To The Opposition.' "It is now an umbrella group for civilians who have taken up arms and militant groups."

Al Jazeera's Nir Rosen describes the FSA as "a name endorsed and signed on to by diverse armed opposition actors throughout the country, who each operate in a similar manner and towards a similar goal, but each with local leadership."

INFORMATION DISSEMINATION
While the U.N. estimates that 7,500 people have been killed in Syria's uprising, activists estimate that hundreds more have died.

Media access has been severely limited in Syria, Internet access is restricted, and local journalists have been suppressed as the opposition and regime present competing narratives of the state of the country.

Activists and citizen journalists have distributed hundreds of photos and videos online that often show dead or injured children and civilians, mutilated bodies, or destroyed neighborhoods. Yet verifying the content of these reports remains nearly impossible. "Plenty of information is coming out from Syria, but the difficulty we find is in verifying the information," said Soazig Dollet, head of the Middle East and North Africa desk of Reporters Without Borders to Al Akhbar. "Because of the state’s strict control of traditional media in the country, social media has become our main source of information. However, the question of who is sending out this information remains unanswered," he told the newspaper.

Reporting from Syria has proved extremely dangerous. AP photographer Rodrigo Abd recounted his time in Syria: "Explosions illuminated the night as we ran, hoping to escape Syria after nearly three weeks of covering a conflict that the government seems determined to keep the world from seeing. Tank shells slammed into the city streets behind us, snipers' bullets whizzed by our heads and the rebels escorting us were nearly out of ammunition. It seemed like a good time to get out of Syria."

While Abd safely reached Turkey, several foreign reporters did not make it out of the country alive. French TV journalist Gilles Jacquier died in January 2011 in Homs. A sniper killed activist and online journalist Rami al-Sayyed on February 22. One day later, American war correspondent Marie Colvin and French photojournalist Remi Ochlik were killed by shelling in Homs.

INTERNATIONAL REACTION
Most of international community's response to the bloodshed in Syria has been harsh. Barack Obama repeatedly has called on Assad to step down. U.N. chief Ban Ki-Moon has described the violence in Homs as "unacceptable before humanity." French President Nicholas Sarkozy called Assad a murderer. Turkey, once Syria's ally, has upbraided Assad, and both the U.S. and the European Union have imposed sanctions on his regime.

The first significant international attempt to end the bloodshed in Syria came from the Arab League. In November 2011, the organization of Arab states negotiated a peace plan with the Assad regime that called for an immediate end to the violence. The agreement also stipulated that monitors from the League's member states would observe the regime's compliance from inside the country. The associated monitor mission, and the Arab League peace plan, failed as the Assad regime intensified its crackdown during the observers' presence and the death toll rose dramatically.

As international pressure on the Assad regime increased and the failure of the League's monitor mission became clear, the organization presented a U.N. Security Council resolution that proposed to end the conflict through the resignation of the president. The resolution was approved by 13 of the Security Council's 15 members, but was vetoed by China and Russia. Moscow has stepped up as Syria's main supporter diplomatically, blocking any possible international action in the United Nations Security Council. The Kremlin also upheld arms deliveries to the country, arguing that Damascus needs the weapons for national defense and national security purposes.

Emerging "Cold War" in the Middle East.

Once again the world is on the brink of a major conflict due to the inability of Iran and the Western powers to agree on the true picture and nature of the Iranian nuclear program. While the Iranians are saying that their nuclear program is for peaceful purposes, that is for the generation of electricity, the west, led by the US and Britain claim the Iranian government is secretly trying to build nuclear weapons so as to become a major nuclear power in the world. The Americans are just waiting for an opportunity to strike, as they are just preventing the Israelis from attacking the Iranian nuclear facilities. Israel has blamed Iran for a series of attacks on its diplomats in Thailand, India and other parts of the world. The Iranian government has vehemently denied these accusations. The Iranians have threatened to close the Straits of Hormuz if they are attacked by the west. The Americans then reacted by daring them, when they intentionally moved one of their battle ships through the water way. This was done twice in a matter of two weeks, just to show how powerful the Americans are. Then comes the Syrian uprising, where the Western powers have taken entrenched positions. They are asking the Syrian president to leave the seat of government and pave way for a new government. On the other side are the Russians and the Chinese who have made their intentions clear to the Americans and the British that they are not going to sit down idle and allow what happened in Libya to be repeated in Syria. They are in support of a dialogue or peaceful approach to the  Syrian crisis. This support by the Chinese and the Russians  for the embattled Syrian president has been termed as an emerging "Cold War" in the Middle East. Iran has also made her intentions clear not to allow the west to have their way in Syria by supporting the government against the rebels who are being supported by the west. Iran has also been hit by sanctions from the EU and the UN. These two situations if not  solved amicably will plunge the Middle East into a crisis as the major world powers have taken entrenched positions. When two elephants fight, its the grass that suffers. This proverb might come true because anything that happens in the Middle East will have far reaching consequences on the developing world. Thus, the British Foreign Minister, Douglas Hague's worst fears will be confirmed when the two sides come out clearly to show their true colors in the Middle East. The next few weeks will determine the emergence of the new "Cold War" in the Middle East. 

Mother Africa Needs No Elections.

I have come to realize the harm that elections have caused in Africa. This has come at a heavy price with the loss of human lives and property. We as Africans try to please the so called western democracies by ascribing to their so called democratic ideologies. Most often election results in African countries are disputed by the parties involved, and this later leads to conflicts with innocent citizens bearing the brunt of a few selfish and greedy politicians. Examples cold be found in the Ivory Coast, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and simmering now is the one in Senegal. You just calculate the huge amounts of money used in organizing elections, this runs into millions of dollars. Why cant we device our own means of choosing our political leaders, and i mean this system should be distinct from the western type of elections. The money used for these elections could be used to improve the living conditions of the citizens of the countries on the African continent. We still live in a continent where people do not have access to the basic needs of life such as good drinking water, stable power supply, good educational infrastructure, access to health care etc. I  see elections in Africa as a waste of time, energy and money. Lets use Ghana as an example. The year 2012 is an election year, and the government is planning to spend almost about $20million on a biometric register and verification process. Do we need to go through all that hustle to elect our leaders, who only promise us the good things when they need our votes but do nothing when they assume the reigns of power. To correct this anomaly, i have some suggestions: Instead of elections, why don't we have a constitution drafted by the people, and all the political parties recognized by this legal document. Guidelines should be clearly specified for this recognition to be accepted by all.  The representatives of all these parties should ballot to choose who would rule in an orderly manner, with a rotational system in place. The moment this rotation ends, another balloting should be done to keep the system working. This i know would be accepted by all the parties, and harmony would prevail in our continent. The legislature must also be made up of representatives of all the political parties chosen by their respective parties. But the party winning the first ballot should be given the opportunity to allow their party leader to become president and he should also choose his ministers and appointees. They stay on for eight years as would be specified in the constitution. When their term ends, the next party which picked the second ballot takes over. This will go on until it gets to the last party on the ballot. Each would serve for eight years. I truly believe we don't need elections in Africa, but hey, these are just the suggestions of an African man who wants to see some change and a departure from what the West wants us to do. Your criticisms and suggestions are welcome.   

Nigeria Bleeds, Mother Africa Cries.

It seems since the new year, 2012 began, not a day passes by without any good news from our brothers in Nigeria. We always hear of bombings which lead to many deaths in some of the Nigerian northern states. More people are being killed by the islamic sect Boko Haram in the name of religion. There is a state of insecurity in nigeria as i write this post. More Christians are fleeing from the northern states as the islamic sect has given them an ultimatum to leave the north or face death. I would like to know what the African Union is doing to combat such terrorist activities? Are they waiting for this crisis to engulf the whole of the West African subregion before they take the necessary actions. When this crisis gets out of hand it will affect the whole of the African continent. Beccuase, when Nigeria starts bleeding, the whole of Africa will cry and the repercursions would be disastrous. What if the Christians in the southern part of the country also decide to sack or kill all moslems there, the unthinkable will happen. What is happening in the north amounts to genocide as hundreds of people are being killed by the Boko Haram sect every week. I just cant fathom what the Nigerian security services are doing about all these killings. ECOWAS must be seen doing something to help the Nigerian Government on this crisis, but it seems the nigerians have been left to their own fate. We should not wait for an escalationb of the crisis before we start sending aid and troops into Nigeria to put an end to the carnage going on there. We should not behave like ostriches and put our heads in the sand and pretend nothing is happening. I love my continent so much that my heart will be broken if this crisis is not resolved by all means possible. We must start behaving like the brothers that we are on our dear continent and help one another in times of conflicts. What happened to the so called African solutions to solve African problems? We should becareful of this Nigerian crisis becuase it can seriuosly affect the growth and development of the African continent. When Mother Africa cries, who do you expect to wipe away the tears for her? Your guess is as good as mine, but hey, you should know that these are just the thoughts of an African brother who loves his continent very much and cant afford to see the continent fail the unborn generations, so lets help stop the bleeding going on in Nigeria.

Neocolonialism In Africa.

My heart is heavy with sadness whenever i see bad images of the African continent on the various international media networks. They keep on showing images of starving African children with flies hovering around them, and dead bodies in conflict zones on my dear continent. They are just trying to show to the whole world that we Africans can not rule ourselves without resorting to war. Thats why the western powers are making everything possible to take over the continent once more so as to control our natural mineral resources. It seems we are giving them the opportunity to do just that. Our political leaders are not helping us curb this trend thats gotten beyond our control. Why cant we follow the example of Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez, who nationalized all the oil drilling installations in his country when the multinational companies refused to accept the 70- 30% he was proposing. He was looking at the interest of the citizens of Venezuela. He also during the latter part of the year 2011 repatriated all the country's gold reserves abroad back to Venezuela. Why cant we follow his example. Our leaders keep fat bank accounts in foreign banks and when they are being hounded out of power, they are exposed and these accounts are frozen by the western powers. Its like we give the western powers the ammunition to propagate their agenda. Now the new form of colonialism is in the form of a fight for the continent's mineral resources. The Chinese, Russians, British, Americans, French etc are all coming in their numbers just to take over our resources. Nigeria is being turned into a lawless state by certain faceless entities, and there might be a western power behind all the chaos and confusion going on in that country. The West is also now asking all African countries to recognize gay and lesbian rights as they have made it a conditionality in their giving of aid to the continent. We must stand up and fight this disease which is trying to destroy our African continent, for it seems we would betray the African continent by doing nothing about this emerging threat. They first start with a group of people being coerced to organize a protest and more people join when the security forces use all means necessary to quell such protests, thats all they need to accuse an African government of committing human rights abuses. But hey, these are just the thoughts of an African man who loves his continent with all his heart, mind and soul.

World War 3?

It seems we started the New Year on a rather sad note as on Christmas Day, two churches were bombed in Nigeria leaving scores of people dead.  Now the Boko Hara sect is warning Christians living in the northern part of the country a one week ultimatum to leave that part of the country. The Iranians also threatened to close the Strait of Hormuz where about 40% of the world crude oil is shipped through. The Americans responded by moving their aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis into the Persian Gulf just to call the bluff of the Iranians. The Chinese have also warned the Americans that they are going to defend the Iranians in case of a war  by the Americans. These might be the precursors to a Third World War if i am not mistaken. This saber rattling by these countries have already pushed the price of crude oil on the world market to an unprecedented level. And we in Africa are feeling the effects as my country Ghana has scrapped off the subsidies that were put on the crude oil. It is bringing hardship on Ghanaians. Nigeria also followed suit by removing all the subsidies placed on imported refined crude oil. Very soon, major protests will break out in most countries around the world as the economic hardship becomes unbearable by the poor masses. The UN as we see right now is just a toothless bulldog as it can not prevent another war from happening. If it should happen  more people are going to die. The question i am asking is that, are the Americans and the Iranians about to start a Third World War? God help us.

Gambian Woman to Head The ICC.

According to Colum Lynch and a few other observers, Fatou Bensouda will become the next top Prosecutor at the International Criminal Court.
Earlier this week, the ICC announced that the four short-listed candidates (Robert Petit of Canada; Andrew Cayley of the UK; Mohamed Chande Othman of Tanzania; and Fatou Bensouda of Gambia), had been whittled down to two.
It has become apparent that the ICC’s Assembly of States Parties wanted to avoid an election by deciding on a “consensus candidate.” Kevin Jon Heller, at Opinio Juris, suggested that the ICC likely conducted informal polling which made clear that a consensus had formed around having an African Prosecutor. Othman subsequently decided to step aside, allowing Bensouda to emerge as the sole candidate for the job. In all likelihood, Othman understood his chances were slim-to-none given that the African Union – which had decided to support an African candidate for Prosecutor  endorsed  Bensouda.
Many readers of JiC will know that Bensouda has long been the favoured candidate to replace outgoing Prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo. Her name was consistently and emphatically mentioned by observers of the Court. This past September, I argued that the stars had aligned for Bensouda – she had the ICC’s top job “in the bag.” Bensouda clearly satisfied all of the political and merit-based criteria to become the ICC’s chief Prosecutor.
The selection of Bensouda as a consensus candidate is important for a number of reasons. Here are a few:
First, the selection of Bensouda, just weeks prior to the day originally set for an election, removes the possibility of a highly political election. Of course, this isn’t necessarily a good thing. An election would have created additional buzz and discussion about key issues surrounding the ICC and its first decade of work.
Second, Bensouda becomes the first African Prosecutor at the ICC. This fact will almost surely garner the most media attention. The African Union has been adamant that an African candidate would be selected, and they got their wish. It will now be very interesting to see how the AU deals with an African Prosecutor. The AU has often expressed frustration and, at times, outright hostility towards the Court for what it, and many of its member states, see as undue bias towards African nations and leaders. Now that the AU has its chosen candidate, will its attitude and rhetoric change?
Third, Bensouda’s ascension to the top job is another remarkable feat for gender parity in international institutions and international politics. The United Nations has never had a female Secretary General. The World Bank has never had a female President.
Fourth, the ICC not only has a lot on its plate, but the number of courses being served is ever-increasing. In the past year alone, two additional situations (Ivory Coast and Libya) were added to the growing list of contexts in which the Court is conducting official investigations and prosecutions. It is not out of the question that others, like Syria, will join Libya, Ivory Coast, Kenya, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan, the Central African Republic, and Uganda, in the near future. It would seem sensible to suggest that, as the Court’s current Deputy Prosecutor, continuity will serve Bensouda well. States didn’t want to mess with the AU on this one.
Fifth, and related to the last point, by all accounts Bensouda is a much more low-key prosecutor than Moreno-Ocampo. Her selection would thus appear to confirm the desire among states parties to select someone who will be more of a ‘secretary’ than a ‘general’ – a prosecutor who won’t ruffle as many feathers.
With Bensouda claiming the single most visible position in the international criminal justice firmament, attention will begin to shift back towards the tenure of the Court’s current Prosecutor. As the ICC’s first Prosecutor, Moreno-Ocampo’s time has been replete with controversy. But he also put the Court on the map and spotlight of international politics, in the face of nay-sayers, critics and a plethora of hostile forces. In the coming weeks, it will be interesting to read and hear retrospectives on a man who, arguably more than anyone else, has shaped the politics and pursuit of international criminal justice.
My heart m,issed a beat when i herad this news. This is an ambush by the international community. Are theyt trying to appease Africans after committing crimes against humanity in Libya? This is a question they would never answer. African leaders must watch out for this might be a Trojan Horse. Beware of the Greeks if they come bearing gifts.